TOKYO — Japan's government proposed a special $50 billion budget to help finance reconstruction efforts Friday and plans to build 100,000 temporary homes for survivors of last month's devastating earthquake and tsunami.

The twin disasters destroyed roads, ports, farms and homes and crippled a nuclear power plant that forced tens of thousands of more people to evacuate their houses for at least several months.

The government said the damage could cost $309 billion, making it the world's most expensive natural disaster.

Unpopular Prime Minister Naoto Kan, under fire for his handling of the crisis, said Japan would have to issue fresh government bonds to fund extra budgets to come, and suggested he would stay on to oversee the process.

"I feel it was my destiny to be prime minister when the disasters and nuclear accident took place," Kan told a news conference.

"I want to work for reconstruction and rebuilding, and present an outline to overcome these two crises. To have that vision in sight is my heartfelt desire as a politician," he added.

Victims move Kan
Kan said he was moved by his conversations with victims during a recent tour of shelters. "I felt with renewed determination that we must do our best to get them back as soon as possible," he told reporters.

Pool via AFP - Getty Images

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan, right, talks with an evacuee at a shelter at Tamura city in Fukushima prefecture Thursday.

The extra $50 billion the Cabinet approved is expected to be only the first installment of reconstruction funding. About $15 billion will go to fixing roads and ports and more than $8.5 billion will go to build temporary homes and clearing rubble.

"This is the first step toward rebuilding Japan after the major disasters," Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda said. Parliament is expected to approve the special budget next week.

More than 27,000 people are dead or missing after the earthquake and tsunami hit northern Japan on March 11.

About 135,000 survivors are living in 2,500 shelters, and many others have moved into temporary housing or are staying with relatives.

As part of the government's recovery plan, it will build 30,000 temporary homes by the end of May and another 70,000 after that, Kan said.

Japan already was mired in a 20-year economic slowdown, Kan said, and he hoped the disaster recovery effort would help lift Japan economically. He urged Japanese to spend money during the upcoming Golden Week holidays to help spur the economy.

"People are feeling that we all must do something, and that will turn into a big strength," he said. "And it will work to help the recovery, and we will overcome both crises."

Recovery efforts have been complicated by the crisis at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, which lost its power and cooling systems in the earthquake and tsunami, triggering fires, explosions and radiation leaks in the world's second-worst nuclear accident.

Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co., which said it will take six to nine months to bring the plant under full control, has been heavily criticized for its handling of the crisis.

'Angry, angry, angry'
TEPCO President Masataka Shimizu was received harshly when he toured a shelter of 1,600 people in Koriyama.

"We're angry, angry, angry," one man shouted at him, according to television footage.

Shimizu apologized to the governor of Fukushima prefecture, Yuhei Sato, an outspoken critic of the response by the government and company to the nuclear crisis.

Sato bluntly told Shimizu the era of nuclear power plants in Fukushima had ended.

"No way. The resumption of nuclear power plants ... no way," he said.

Meanwhile, Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko visited Kita Ibaraki, a port wrecked by the tsunami about 60 miles north of Tokyo.

The royal couple surveyed the damage along the waterfront, where blocks of concrete were jumbled by the huge waves. When told that a man died there, they showed their respects with a deep bow toward the sea. They also visited an evacuation center.

An extra 250 police were sent to man roadblocks with flashing "Off Limits" signs Friday to stop some of the 80,000 evacuees from sneaking back to homes inside the now-sealed 12-mile evacuation zone around the stricken plant.

Authorities planned to erect fences on side streets, said Fukushima police spokesman Yasunori Okazaki. The order that took effect Friday is meant to limit radiation exposure and theft in the mainly deserted zone.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano appealed for residents of five areas with relatively high levels of radiation outside the sealed zone to prepare for evacuation within a month.

But Norio Kanno, chief of Iitate, a village of 6,200, questioned whether everyone would be able to move in time.

"It is really vexing. Just one nuclear accident is destroying everything," he said.

Waves pour over a seawall and roar into a seaside village near the mouth of Hei River on March 11 as the tsunami generated by the massive earthquake hits shore.
(Mainichi Newspaper via EPA)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

An aerial photo shows Sendai Airport being inundated by a tsunami on March 11. Later reports said the first wave hit 26 minutes after the quake struck at 2:46 p.m. local time.
(Kyodo News via Reuters)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

A swirling pattern is evident in this aerial photo of the tsunami as it hit a port in Oarai, Ibaraki prefecture on March 11.
(Kyodo News via AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Toya Chiba, a reporter for local newspaper Iwate Tokai Shimbun, is swept away while taking pictures at the mouth of the Owatari River during the tsunami at Kamaishi port, Iwate prefecture. Chiba managed to survive in the rush of water by grabbing a dangling rope and climbing onto a coal heap around 30 feet high after being swept away for about 100 feet, Kyodo News reports.
(Kamaishi Port Office / Kyodo via Reuters)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

A line of residents seeking water snakes across the playground of a school in Sendai, Miyagi prefecture, on March 13, two days after the earthquake.
(Kyodo News via AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

An "SOS" signal scrawled on the sports field of a high school beckons potential rescuers on March 13 in the town of Minami Sanriku, Miyagi prefecture.
(Kyodo News via Reuters)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Editor's note:
This image contains graphic content that some viewers may find disturbing.

Click to view the image, or use the buttons above to navigate away.

The body of a victim of the twin disaster lays on the stairs of a destroyed house in Sendai, Miyagi prefecture, on March 13.
(David Guttenfelder / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Sixty-year-old Hiromitsu Shinkawa waves to members of Japan Maritime Self-Defence Force preparing to rescue him about 9 miles off Fukushima prefecture on March 13. Shinkawa survived by clinging to a piece of roof after the tsunami hit his hometown of Minamisoma.
(Japanese Defense Forces via AFP - Getty Images)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

An explosion at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant sends a plume of smoke skyward on March 14. The blast was believed to have been caused by a buildup of hydrogen inside the reactor building, caused by the partial meltdown of nuclear fuel inside. The plant was crippled after the earthquake cut power to the station and tsunami waves knocked out backup generators.
(NTV / FCT)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Officers examine a Mitsubishi F-2 fighter jet of the Japanese Air Self-Defense Force on March 14. The warplane was swept by the tsunami into a building at Matsushima base in Higashimatsushima, Iwate prefecture.
(Kyodo News via Reuters)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Refugees, including 53 people who were rescued from a retirement home during the tsunami, take shelter inside a school gym in the leveled city of Kesennuma, Miyagi prefecture, on March 17.
(David Guttenfelder / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Members of Japan Self-Defense Force pray over the body of a tsunami victim in Onagawa, Miyagi prefecture, on March 20.
(Shuji Kajiyama / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Tomoko Yagi looks at two firetrucks that were tossed around like toys in the tsunami in Kamaishi, Iwate prefecture, on March 20.
(Lee Jae-Won / Reuters)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Manami Kon, 4, uses the Japanese "hiragana" characters she just learned to write a letter to her missing mother in the devastated city of Miyako, Iwate prefecture, on March 22 . "Dear Mommy. I hope you're alive. Are you OK?" read the letter, which took about an hour to write. Also missing were the little girl's father and sister.
(Norikazu Tateishi / The Yomiuri Shimbun via AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Tokyo Electric Power Co. workers collect data in the control room for the Unit 1 and 2 reactors at the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant on March 23.
(Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency via AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

An aerial photo taken by an unmanned drone shows the damaged units of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant on March 24.
(Air Photo Service via EPA)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Two residents exchange words as they are reunited two weeks after the earthquake and tsunami in a makeshift public bath set up outside a shelter in Yamamoto, Miyagi prefecture, on March 25.
(Shuji Kajiyama / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

A Japanese funeral parlor worker shovels dirt onto the coffins of victims of the earthquake and tsunami at a mass funeral in Yamamoto, Miyagi prefecture, on March 26.
(David Guttenfelder / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

A lone pine tree stands in a devastated area iof Rikuzentakaka, Iwate prefecture, on March 27. It was the only one among tens of thousands of other pine trees forming "Takata Matsubara," or Takata seaside pine forest, standing after the March 11 tsunami washed away all the others, local media said.
(Kyodo News via AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

A woman whose house was washed away loses control of her emotions on March 29 as she talks about the disaster that befell her hometown of Kesennuma, Miyagi prefecture.
(Kuni Takahashi)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Officials of the Tokyo Electric Power Co., (TEPCO), including Chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata, center, Vice President Takashi Fujimoto, second from left, bow before a news conference at the company's head office in Tokyo on March 30.
(Itsuo Inouye / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

A man rides a bicycle in between the ships that were washed ashore by the March 11 tsunami, on March 30, in Kesennuma, Miyagi prefecture.
(Eugene Hoshiko / AP)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

An elderly woman waves to her grandchildren in Minamisanriku, Miyagi prefecture, on April 3, as authorities began a mass evacuation of approximately 1,100 homeless survivors to shelters elsewhere.
(Jiji Press via AFP - Getty Images)
ShareBack to slideshow navigation

Editor's note:
This image contains graphic content that some viewers may find disturbing.